The honourable member just broke the hearts of an awful lot of Canadians who thought they would only have to listen to me for a maximum of two hours. So be it. We are where we are. Good thing I made a pit stop on my way, and we'll see where we end up.
We last left off, Chair, talking about of course our motion. I had assured you that I was very much aware of your mandate as the chair to ensure that my comments remain within the parameters of the motion. I've had some people over the last few days ask why I am not talking more about the bill, and the answer to that is, the second I start talking about the content of the bill, you're going to be all over me, Chair, because at that point I would no longer be talking about the actual motion that's in front of us and would have sort of slid into debate.
Being respectful of your mandate and knowing that you want to keep us all on track, I will endeavour...and have laid out my thoughts in a way that I think continues to respect the rules and the boundaries upon which we can speak to any given motion.
So, where to begin. Such an embarrassment of riches in terms of things to talk about. I think the first thing I'd like to do maybe is talk a little bit about the mandate of the committee, because the motion, of course, is always predicated on the work of the committee.
An understanding of the mandate and the rules of the committee is an important part of understanding the essence of what we're trying to do with our motion. And I remind everybody that our motion is actually very straightforward, and the part of it that is giving the government the greatest amount of trouble is the part where we talk about talking to Canadians, going out into the communities and giving people a chance to have a say about their election law in a way that's meaningful. We believe, in the NDP, in the opposition, that we should be getting out of the safety and security of the Ottawa bubble, and that we should be giving Canadians an opportunity to voice their concerns. And many concerns there are, and I'll get to that part later.
I will be speaking about some of the roles of the committee chair. I will also be talking about what took place not long ago in Yellowknife, where there was another piece of legislation. The discussion, in some ways, Chair, is that the House of Commons, as a rule, normal procedure, doesn't necessarily travel on every bill. It's more commonplace when we do studies.
But the fact remains that although it may not be the usual process, it is not unusual to the extent of being rare or an extreme stretch of the rules that a committee would travel on an actual bill. Of course, we have the evidence of Bill C-15. Just at the end of January, on January 27, specifically, they were in Yellowknife holding hearings—wait for it—on a bill. So any argument that what we're suggesting is an extreme aberration or is stretching the rules or the credulity of members in terms of what's normal is specious. It is in fact a permitted, useful, important tool for committees to travel on certain bills when it's necessary.
I remind the members of the government, through you, Chair, that we already tried to do this in a way that was amicable, that would involve everybody with the least amount of politics, and the government refused. What I'm referring to is when we asked that the bill be sent directly to committee after first reading, and the government—again, you know the kinds of games they play—got up and made speeches: “Well, clearly, the NDP doesn't want to debate the bill because they've already made a motion, or indicated they wanted to send it off to committee.”
Once again it's the government playing fast and loose with the truth.
The reality is that it is a mechanism that is in place to permit members of the House of Commons, through their committees, to start discussing a bill without as much politics. Here's why.
Normally what happens is that the first reading, as a rule, is pretty perfunctory; you stand up, read the bill, it's accepted, there are a couple of formalities, and boom, it's in the system. The second reading is where we're voting in principle; it's at second reading where the parties tend to start locking in. The government stands behind their bill; they're not going to stand up at second reading and start talking about problems with the bill or things that need to be changed, that will happen at committee. They're not about to start that kind of a discussion on a bill without recognizing that they have to stand behind the integrity of their bill. After the second reading, that's when it goes to committee. The problem is that we've already locked in politically; the opposition parties have been pressed by the media about whether they are in favour of this. People get asked if they're in favour of a bill sometimes before it's even finished being introduced to the House. Are you in favour of it, or are you opposed to it? It's the nature of politics in the modern-day communications era.
What happens is parties move quickly, oftentimes without the opportunity to do the kind of in-depth research that one would like to, especially if it has you going, later on, that the position we took in the beginning now that we understand it a little better we have to massage it, and so on. There's a whole political thing around that, and it's the normal way of doing things, and it serves us well in most cases. There are times, however, and this should have been one of them, when...much like we finally are doing on Ukraine, after the embarrassment for the government of being so petty last week as to send a non-unity delegation to a country that needs to be united. We will not let them forget that; it was a sad moment in this government.
I hear you, Chair. Thank you.
We're past that now and we're working together. That's my point; now we're where we should be as a House on the question of Ukraine. Whether we stay there or not depends on how we go forward. But I know that we're all going to do everything we can to stay united around that. Why? Isn't it political? Of course, it's political, it's hugely political, it's arguably the most political question on the planet right now. But the fact remains that some things are so important that we have an obligation, as difficult as that is—it seems easy from the outside—and we need to get above that. From time to time, we have to have the ability to rise above the politics of the moment for a bigger cause. In this case, the cause is the freedom that Ukrainians are fighting for in terms of their country. In this case, what we're talking about is revamping all of our election laws.
Chair, it seems to me that if ever there was a useful time for the House of Commons and the members to act in a unified way, and to try to find a set of rules that everyone can live with.... I use the example of the Olympics, and I think it's a perfect example. No one country set the rules for the games at the Olympics. It wasn't the host country, it wasn't the biggest—being the United States—it wasn't those that won the most medals, it was everybody, and everybody got a say and everybody knew the rules were fair when they went into it. It's clear, not only from the bill...and we see that now, and we'll see it more as we get into it, but we also see it in the way the government acted, Chair. The first chance they had in the House of Commons on this bill after they neglected to consult with any of the political parties and even the Chief Electoral Officer.... How outrageous to bring in an election law. It's insulting to bring in a new election law, and the Chief Electoral Officer was not even consulted. It was pretty clear to us from the get-go that this government was not interested in trying to rise above politics, in trying to have a fair, level playing field for everybody.
They talk about that when they talk about trade issues. They don't want to talk like that when we talk about our election laws.
So it was pretty clear to us, Chair, right from the beginning, that this government's only intent is that by Canada Day they want this law. Quite frankly, they're prepared to take any criticism that I can give, that my colleagues can give, that the public might give, that the media may bring down on them. They are prepared to pay that price in exchange for an election law that tilts the rules in their favour. That's where we are.
Our attempt to bring us back to where we should be, if that can be done this late in the game, was to use a mechanism...in fact, the mechanism was so effective federally that when I was at Queen's Park we brought in a similar rule to have that tool available to us. I can remember specifically that we were dealing with mental health reform. We used that mechanism. It was the first time ever. Norm Sterling, a good Progressive Conservative from Ontario, deserves credit. For the longest time he liked this rule, and when he finally became the House leader he brought it in. He adopted it from the rule that we have here. Again, that rule is that once the bill has been introduced at first reading, rather than then moving to second reading—and as I said people start putting political skin in the game—and having to vote, that you send it off to committee before anybody's locked in on anything. Why? Because it gives everybody the latitude to talk about going in any direction because they haven't pre-locked themselves into a position, either deliberately or inadvertently, by virtue of the words that are chosen at the time.
Councillor Brad Clark in Hamilton was the minister responsible. He wasn't minister then, he was parliamentary assistant, but he did such a good job that in the next round of promotions he was promoted from a parliamentary assistant—as they are called at Queen's Park as opposed to parliamentary secretaries here—to a full minister, the Minister of Labour. He did a great job. The process worked. It de-fanged all the politics. It neutralized everything and then when the bill landed, clearly the government was saying by virtue of their words and their actions that they wanted to see if they could build collectively as good a bill as possible, given the issue: it was mental health. There was no desire to play politics with mental health. There was a need to make things better, to fix some things. Everybody felt that commitment, and it was good work.
I still think one of the reasons Brad got into cabinet was because I, and my good friend the late Dominic Agostino, an absolutely outstanding elected representative, were so good at praising him that we convinced the premier. To be fair, part of it was we wanted a regional minister. We didn't have one in Hamilton. The closest was Burlington, and we didn't consider that to be hometown, and we really wanted and needed a minister from the area, so we had an ulterior purpose. Nonetheless, we still couldn't have done it if councillor Clark, then parliamentary assistant Clark, hadn't done such an outstanding job. So we thought this was a great opportunity for this bill. That was our attempt to get the government to agree to send it here after first reading.
That would mean, Chair, that rather than getting all caught up in the politics, where we are right now—we're into the politics of things—rather than that, we would have gotten right into the issues. Why? Because we still had, if we needed them politically, the tools available when you eventually report back to the House, and you still have a second reading debate.
You still have a second reading vote, and you can still send it back to the committee if you want, with instructions, or you can accept the report and forward it to the minister. All of the options that were available before are still there. You don't give up any of them, but what you do is, you send it to a committee without all the politics, in the hope that making a good law would be the priority.
So how should this have been done? There should have been consultations with the opposition parties. There would have been, if it were a minority, I guarantee you. There should have been consultations, as there were in the past, Chair. This is not something new.
In the past when these kinds of changes were considered, the first step would be to talk to the opposition parties and let them know what you're planning, let them know that this is what you're going to do, and make it a collaborative effort. The second thing you would do, one would think, is ask the Chief Electoral Officer and Elections Canada to come in and give you a briefing on what they think. Remember, still no politics.
I know that work can be done, because we've done it before. In fact, I just happen to have with me some of my notes from that work. You'll remember this, Chair. This is like a blast from the past. You probably have one yourself, framed on the wall as a souvenir of all those years when you chaired this. Remember these?
Remember this? This is a spreadsheet. What's fascinating about this is that it's headed up as “Mapping of the Chief Electoral Officer's Recommendations”. That report was on political financing. This gives you—you can see how it's laid out—what it's about. For the value, it says “trust” and then the subject matter, the current status of the law, the recommendations, and the desired outcome.
